


For the Very First Time

by Xparrot



Category: Lucifer (TV)
Genre: (I'm not really sorry), Awkward Conversations, Drinking & Talking, F/M, Gen, Girls' Night Out, Humor, I'm sorry Lucifer, talking about sex, the unexpected hitches in celestial/human relations
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-21
Updated: 2018-03-21
Packaged: 2019-04-06 05:37:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,820
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14050059
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Xparrot/pseuds/Xparrot
Summary: There's something unexpected bothering Chloe about her new relationship. Fortunately she's got friends. Unfortunately...she's got friends.





	For the Very First Time

**Author's Note:**

> So, yeah, not my last Lucifer fic. (I'm so sorry for this. Once it was in my head it wouldn't leave.)

Ella waited until the third round of drinks to ask, "So...what's the scoop?"

"The scoop?" Chloe said.

Ella waved around the tiki bar. "Girls' night out—but not at Lux?"

Chloe ducked her head to peer down into her daiquiri. "I just thought a change of pace would be nice."

"It is," Linda hastened to reassure. "...Even if we do have to pay for the drinks here..."

"And random dudes keep hitting on us instead of waiting for us to come to them..."

"And the scenery isn't as nice," and Linda shot a mildly critical look at the sweaty bartender in the Hawaiian shirt.

"But they've got more drinks in coconuts?" Chloe said weakly.

"Uh-huh," Ella said. "So Dr. Martin, what's your professional opinion, when a friend suggests you go out to a place that _isn't_ run by her boyfriend, so whatever you talk about is less likely to get back to him?"

"Hmm, an interesting question, Ms. Lopez. Especially when she conspicuously doesn't invite the fourth of our tribe?"

"Maze is up in San Fran for the weekend, she's helping this psychic detective track a—"

"—When she carefully times the night so that our other friend doesn't feel left out, but also doesn't have her own personal loyalty to said boyfriend put to the test," Linda corrected herself. "Which leads one to wonder—professionally—what that test is."

"I hate you both," Chloe said. " _Professionally_."

"Hazards of solving mysteries for a living," Ella said cheerfully. "So come on, dish! We all know you've been walking on air, but what's the downside of dating the Devil? Does he leave the toilet seat up? Does he get the sheets gritty with hellfire ash?"

Chloe snorted into her drink. "No ash," she said. "Feathers, occasionally...he might be molting?"

"Molting...because he's a fallen angel, with wings, right," Ella said, grinning. "It's totally adorable how you've gone all-in with his method acting since you got together." She cocked her head. "Does he even keep it up in bed? Is that the problem, that he's too into roleplay?"

Linda coughed into her glass. 

"Nooo..." Chloe trailed off. "Roleplay in bed isn't the problem..."

"Ah-hah!" Ella sat up straight on her wicker stool, eyes as bright as if they were at a particularly gruesome crime scene. "So what in bed _is_?"

Chloe fanned herself with a coaster in an unconvincing attempt to pretend her flush was due to the bar's struggling air conditioning—another feature that was never an issue at Lux—"Nothing, everything's awesome! I just wanted to have a fun night out with my friends."

"Uh- _huh_ ," Ella said. "I'm gonna go order us another round. Right now."

She didn't ask anything further when she got back from the bar, instead went into a story about encountering and failing to recognize one of her favorite actors at Comicon. Encouraged by Linda's questions, that lasted through the arrival of the new drinks.

Then it was only a matter of time, until Chloe finally broke. "So, umm, Linda, this is kind of a personal question—but nothing to do with his therapy, I swear, so—"

"Ask away," Linda said, with the kind of expansiveness she got halfway through a fourth margarita.

"When you were. _With_ Lucifer..." Ella's eyes went huge, but she kept her lips around her mai tai's straw and only listened, as Chloe stammered out, "Did he—was he ever—how often did he, um...finish prematurely?"

Linda choked so hard she coughed up a good fourth of said fourth margarita. "Lucifer," she said. Then repeated it for good measure. " _Lucifer_. Came early on you? When?"

Chloe's already pink cheeks darkened another shade closer to rose. "Before. Umm. Before we really get down to business. And—it's not like he doesn't fulfill his end of it; he doesn't seem to count it as sex if there aren't multiple orgasms—on my part, I mean—which, that's awesome, zero complaints there. He doesn't even need his toy collection if I'm not in the mood, and it's great how well he can, uh, compensate, and I don't want to—it's not like I care, not really. If he has some physical thing, it's not... But it'd be nice, you know, to get some. The traditional way. At least once in a while. So I was wondering if with you, he ever..."

Linda swallowed the dregs of her margarita at a measured pace, while she flapped her other hand at the bartender until she got his attention, then held up two desperate fingers.

"Man," Ella said, shaking her head. "That's kind of a bummer.—Like, you said it, it's not the guy's fault! But still, spoils the fantasy, when you're imagining this ragingly virile sex god, and then it turns out he's only human—uhh, which isn't to say I fantasize about your boyfriend—that much—not deliberately—not _that_ often—oh, I am so sorry—" and she determinedly fastened her lips around her straw again.

"It's okay, Ella," Chloe said, smiling kindly. "Really. Sorry to have ruined the fantasy for you."

"Well, not completely _ruined_ , but...I'm gonna stop talking now for real."

The bartender arrived with the double margarita. Linda swallowed half in one go and then said, "Lucifer doesn't. Didn't. With me...that was not an issue."

"I can't believe you two went out! That must've been hot," Ella said, and then glanced at Chloe. "—Shutting up again!"

Chloe gave her arm an understanding pat but kept her attention on Linda. "So he could follow through?"

"He never had _any_ problems. In that department. Or any other, that I can recall," Linda said. "...You mean, you haven't actually had standard PIV sex with him? At all?"

"Or non-standard," Chloe said gloomily. "And he owns eighteen copies of the Kama Sutra, too. One being the original he co-authored."

Ella giggled. Linda remembered to, after a second. She took another gulp of her drink and remarked, "When we were sleeping together, his refractory period was...stunningly brief."

"Yeah," Chloe said. "That hasn't helped, really. Just makes things messier. I can't even blow him, and I've always liked—uh. Anyway." She sighed. "I was expecting—well, I mean, I didn't seriously think he could live up to the hype he was promoting. But I thought I was going to get more than...first high school boyfriend?"

"—Oh my God," Linda said. 

Chloe winced at the invocation. "I sure hope not..."

Linda grabbed her arm. "That's what it is, isn't it—he goes off as soon as you start anything? Kissing, fondling?"

"Try just a touch, anywhere—heck, just a _look_ , a couple of times!"

"Aww," Ella said. "I mean, it's annoying, but it's kind of sweet, too, that just a look from you does it for him?"

"But it's not _me_ ," Chloe said, "he's just got a hair-trigger—like, he's obviously juvenile in other ways, but I didn't think this—"

"No, it's you," Linda said. "It's definitely you. That hype—if anything he undersells it. And whenever I was with him, his endurance was...umm. Inhuman."

Chloe's eyes widened, and then her whole face collapsed into despair. "Shit." She downed the rest of her drink fast enough to give herself an ice headache, slammed the glass down on the table and said, "Of course, that's it. It's my, my— _effect_ —"

"No." Linda shook her head. "That's not what I meant. He's made out with people in front of you before without any issues, right?"

"...Yeah?"

"And he's not having any trouble when he's on the job with you, or I think I would've heard. It's when it's just the two of you. This isn't physical," Linda said. "It's mental—it's emotional. Like Ella said, you do it for him like no one else has."

"But he—he's had...a lot," Chloe said, trying and failing to indicate the entire history of the known universe with only hand gestures. "A lot of romantic partners before me. A _lot_."

"Yes," Linda said, "but not any whom he was in love with. Physical and sexual intimacy he's exceedingly familiar with, but emotional intimacy is a whole new deal for him. And the combination is apparently...explosive."

"Awww!" Ella cooed.

"What? No." Chloe shook her head. "I can't be his—his first? Come on, he's a grown—uh, man. He must have had plenty of relationships before."

"You sure about that?" Ella said. "No disrespect, I love the guy, but he's kind of a basket case, and he doesn't really relate to people normally. It's all superficial, you know? Except with you, and all of us around you, sort of. Plus, everything he's said about his family, how he grew up, they sound messed up."

"To say the least," Linda murmured.

"And his brother's a total sweetheart, obviously, but not really demonstrative, and there's all those deep underlying issues between them, whatever they are. And he sleeps, or slept, around a ton, but he didn't ever seem to actually _date_ anyone before you, that I noticed? And I'm pretty good at noticing," Ella said. "So yeah. I could buy that you're his first. Not just first crush, even—first time really loving somebody."

"I can't comment specifically on account of therapist-client privilege," Linda put in, "but what she said," and she saluted Ella with her empty margarita glass.

"Oh," Chloe said. She sank her face down into her arms on the table. "Oh hell—no, not that; I mean, goddamn— _no_! Oh, what am I supposed to do, most of my usual swears are ruined..."

Linda patted her back. "There, there. There's always 'fuck.'"

"Which is the _problem_ ," Chloe mumbled into her arms, with a catch that was either a sob or a giggle.

"But if that is his problem," Ella said, "then maybe he'll get over it? My high school boyfriend was awesome, after the first couple misfires."

Chloe lifted her head enough to eye the silver cross around Ella's neck. "You were having sex in high school?"

"Was I ever! Todd was such a dreamboat. And he had a thing for Catholic school uniforms...but yeah," Ella shrugged, touched her necklace. "I took the long way round to finding God. And you can't unring that bell, you know? So your boyfriend back then, what was he like?"

"I didn't actually go to high school," Chloe said. "Child actor, tutors instead. So it wasn't until college that I went out with anyone, and Miguel was more experienced..."

"My first time was with my anthropology professor," Linda said thoughtfully, and then rolled her eyes at their looks. "All right, yes, I've always struggled with certain boundaries. But Ella has a point. Especially if this is more psychological than physiological, then that's my bailiwick. There are strategies. Self-control has always been a challenge for Lucifer, so this would be a good exercise for him even on a broader therapeutic basis."

Chloe's eyes went round. "Ooooh no, oh no, you can't, you can't tell him that I told you—"

"I won't," Linda said. "Girls-night-out privilege counts, too. But something's been bugging him anyway, and I'm betting this is it. Especially if he can be made to realize that it's getting to you, that'll be a powerful motivator."

"Seems like too much power's the problem," Chloe snorted. Then she put her head back down on the table, resting her cheek on her arm as she sighed, "It'd be...nice. But I don't—I don't want to make him feel like he's not...it's good, you know? Even with this thing, it's... It's not quite what I was expecting, and that's good. Really good."

"Awww," Ella said again. "You guys, you slay me with the cute. We gotta toast to this—I'll go get us more! Ooh, maybe a volcano bowl—"

Chloe watched her make her way to the bar and groaned. "What, has she been exercising her liver with Maze?"

"Probably," Linda sighed, and poked Chloe's arm. "Up and at 'em, Chloe; you can't leave me to face a volcano bowl alone."

 

* * *

 

They shared a taxi ride home. Ella's was closest; after she was out of the cab and bouncing up the stairs to her condo, Linda asked Chloe, "Your place, or?"

Chloe yawned, snuggling into the cab's vinyl seat and half on Linda's shoulder, and said without opening her eyes, "Trixie's overnight at Dan's, but..."

"Lux," Linda told the driver. No address needed, of course.

They'd driven a couple minutes when Chloe mumbled, "So, as a psychologist—psychiatrist—what would you say—what does it say about me as a person, that I'm more freaked out about dating a—a virgin—"

" _Virgin?!_ " Linda squeaked, quivering with giggles.

"You know what I mean! A love virgin—that I'm his _first_ —how am I more freaked out about that than about how I'm dating the _actual Devil?_ "

"It says..." Linda started to state, then took another moment to get the snickering under control before concluding, "In my professional opinion, it says that you have a really, really weird life."

"No, seriously," Chloe said. "I've gotten over the Devil thing—well, no, I haven't, that's always going to be—what the, what the _fuck_ —he's got _wings_ , Linda! Wings! With feathers!—But it's not... This. This feels different."

"Yeah," Linda said. "Because it is. His old job, the wings—those are just details."

"Pretty freaking enormous details. With _feathers_."

"Yes, but they're not personal to you—they don't have anything to do with you. While as this, what you are to him...when you found out the truth about him, you were scared, right? But only at first."

Chloe nodded. "Until I figured out, you know. That it wasn't an act or something. That who I knew was who he is, really."

"Exactly," Linda said. "He's—well, not that he's not dangerous; he could be. But not to you. Even if you broke up with him—you're not scared that he'd do anything to you. Or to the planet, for that matter. He _could_ , but he wouldn't."

"Yeah, no way," Chloe agreed.

"So you don't have any real reason to be freaked out by what he is. But this—what you mean to him. You could hurt him, badly, not even meaning to. There's nothing quite like a first love. And losing it, however—nothing hurts quite like that, either. It's its own type of pain—maybe not the worst, but unique, as unique as everything else about the first time. And you don't want to be the one to hurt him like that. Not because you're afraid of what he is or could do; but because you, personally, don't want to see him hurt."

"I don't," Chloe said softly. She turned her head into Linda's shoulder to hide her face. "I really don't."

The cab driver was darting curious glances at them in the rearview mirror. Linda thought about making some comment about method actors or roleplaying, but couldn't come up with anything amusing enough to bother.

She put her arm around Chloe's shoulders, squeezed. "What you said about him being juvenile—you might not be that far off. I've never figured out how old he is in, uh, 'angel years'? And it's not like human developmental patterns would apply anyway. But he's growing up now, in ways he never has before. And that'll hurt some, no matter what. It always does. He'll learn to deal with it, same as all of us have."

"This is just great," Chloe muttered. "Dating a guy almost as old as time itself, and _I'm_ the one feeling like a cradle-robber."

Linda snickered again. "You're just lucky he doesn't look his age. In either direction. Nice of him to split the difference like that."

"Mmm, yeah," Chloe agreed. " _Very_ nice."

The taxi slowed to a stop. Outside the window, Lux's glowing white heights thrust up into the murky LA night. Chloe tipped her head against the glass, idly admiring and not registering that the driver needed to be paid until Linda already had her credit card out. She waved off Chloe's fumbling for her wallet, opened the door and gave her a shove out. "I've got this. You, get up there. Have fun—if you last for it. Or if he does."

No therapist should have such a wicked smirk, even the Devil's himself. Chloe made a face at her friend as she heaved herself out of the taxi, found her footing on the rough pavement under her heels. "I'm sogonna regret telling you tomorrow, aren't I."

"Probably," Linda said. Then her smile softened. "But it's worth it, right—even before you get this worked out, and once you do, I swear, it'll be—well. It's worth it anyway, that's the important thing."

"Yeah," Chloe said, looking up at the shining tower before the city, until its brightness brought tears to her eyes. "It is."


End file.
